Liberals slam ‘bloody minded’ pursuit.

Members of the parliamentary cyber-safety committee have criticised new Prime Minister Julia Gillard for standing behind her party’s controversial internet filtering proposal.

Yesterday, the Joint Select Committee on Cyber-safety met with Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and content providers to discuss how best to protect Australians from online risks.

Representatives from Internode, Yahoo!7, the Australian Information and Industry Association (AIIA) and the Australian Library and Information Association (ALIA), opposed the proposal, recommending the use of commercially available software and educational initiatives instead.

Other industry witnesses, including representatives from Symantec, Netbox Blue and Telstra, rallied behind a more coordinated approach that involved improving law enforcement and education.

Senator Stephen Conroy, our current Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, has proposed – rather naively in my opinion – that the Internet in Australia be “censored”. That all Internet Service Providers be “required” to filter any and all content that you, the Australian Taxpayer, wish to visit.

On the surface, this is intended to protect people from such nasties as child pornography which, I believe, he is under the impression is rife on the Internet. I’ve been “online” since the mid 80’s, and on what is now known as “the internet” since 1990 (before the WWW existed) and I have NEVER, in all my browsing, encountered any “kiddie porn” accidentally.

Nor have I encountered any deliberately (I’ve never looked !!).

Senator Conroy seems to conveniently ignore the fact that more “kiddie porn” is exchanged daily via Australia Post than over the Internet – and it is far more secure from “search and seizure” and tracing back to the originator (so they can be hurt – BADLY !!)

I’m hoping that this site might prove a useful resource for discussion, sharing of facts (not rumor and innuendo) and as a place where we can co-ordinate some sort of plan of action against it. I will be inviting Senator Conroy to personally look at this site and partake of discussion with us.

Let me have your ideas, your suggestions, your poor and wretched (oops, wrong country !!) – we are all in this together, and together we can make a change.